An Iranian man accused of being the kingpin of a network targeting dissidents is accused of hiring two Canadians, including a member of the Hells Angels, to kill two Iranian refugees living in Maryland, according to charges unsealed Monday.
The man, Naji Sharifi Zindashti, 49, is accused of being a drug dealer and murderer in Iran. In December, a federal grand jury in Minnesota charged him with orchestrating a plan to kill an unidentified Iranian defector and another person in late 2020 and early 2021 using an encrypted messaging app to recruit assassins.
Mr. Zindashti connected with Damion Ryan, 43, who, in turn, recruited Adam R. Pearson, 29, according to court documents. Prosecutors identified Mr. Pearson as a “full member of the illegal Hells Angels Motorcycle Club” who was living illegally in Minnesota.
Both men are serving time in Canadian prisons on unrelated charges. In a chilling exchange described in one of the indictments, Mr Pearson signaled his intention to shoot one of his targets in the head to send a message on behalf of his Iranian handler.
“We have to erase his head from his torso,” Mr Pearson said in an intercepted communication on the encrypted Sky ECC platform.
For unclear reasons, the strikes never took place.
The men — who claimed to have organized a group of four, including a driver — agreed to a $350,000 payment in January 2021. Mr. Zindashti, who was identified by the Treasury Department as a drug trafficker working at the behest of Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security, sent them photographs of the targets, a man and a woman, along with maps.
He appears to have paid them only $20,000 in travel expenses, prosecutors said.
The charges stem from a multi-year investigation by the FBI, the Department of Justice and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police.
Law enforcement said the investigation was ongoing and did not rule out the possibility that others may be charged.
“To those in Iran who plot assassinations on American soil and the criminals who work with them, let today’s indictments send a clear message: The Department of Justice will pursue you as long as necessary,” Assistant Attorney General Matthew G. Olsen said in a statement. of the national security department of the ministry.
This is not the first time a member of the Hells Angels has been linked to Iran. In 2023, a court in Dusseldorf, Germany, convicted a man who tried to burn down a synagogue after a gang member working with officials in Tehran asked him to do so, according to German prosecutors.
The unsealing of the indictment comes at a time of rising tensions between the United States and Iran, a day after three American servicemen were killed in an Iranian-backed militia attack on a base in Jordan. President Biden vowed to fight back.
The Justice Department has warned that many foreign powers, including Iran, Russia and China, are becoming increasingly brazen in their attacks on dissidents and refugees living in the United States.
In January, federal prosecutors in Brooklyn unsealed charges against three men in a plot hatched in Iran to kill Masih Alinejad, an American human rights activist who criticized the country’s repression of women.
In June, a federal grand jury in New York indicted an Indian man in a plot to kill a Sikh dissident living in New York. Prosecutors said Nikhil Gupta, 52, worked with an unidentified Indian government official to recruit an assassin, according to the charges. Mr. Gupta was arrested in Prague and is being extradited to the United States by Czech authorities.
The three defendants accused of working for Iran are all charged with conspiracy to commit two hit-and-run murders. Mr. Pearson is also charged with one count of possession of a firearm by a fugitive from justice and one count of possession of a firearm by an illegal alien in the United States.
After the indictment was made public, the Treasury and British officials announced they had imposed sanctions against Mr. Zindashti and associates who “have carried out numerous acts of transnational repression, including assassinations and kidnappings.”
Finance ministry officials said Mr Zindashti was behind the 2020 kidnapping of the dissident, who was smuggled to Iran, summarily tried and executed. They also accused Mr Zindashti and his men of murdering a former Iranian cyber security official in 2019 who had denounced the country’s leadership. They also said Mr. Zindashti was responsible for the 2017 assassination of Saeed Karimian, the owner of Gem TV, a network of television channels critical of Tehran.
It was not immediately clear who is representing Mr Ryan or Mr Pearson in the case.
Iran’s UN representative did not immediately return a request for comment.
